★Mrs. H. A.Clarkson 20,feb.03 THE NEW YORK 231249 ASTOR, LENOX AND TILDEN FOUNDATIONS. 1903 Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1845, by WILLIAM RUSSELL, In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the District of Massachusetts. STEREOTYPED BY GEORGE A. CURTIS; NEW ENGLAND TYPE AND STEREOTYPE FOUNDRY. ΤΟ DR. JAMES RUSH, WHOSE WORK ON THE PHILOSOPHY OF THE HUMAN VOICE, HAS RENDERED DEFINITE AND EXACT INSTRUCTION PRACTICABLE IN ELOCUTION, THE FOLLOWING MANUAL IS RESPECTFULLY DEDICATED. PREFACE. THE design of the exercises presented in this manual, is to furnish the groundwork of practical elocution, and whatever explanations are needed for the training of the organs and the cultivation of the voice. The system of instruction, adopted in the present volume, is founded on Dr. Rush's treatise, "The Philosophy of the Human Voice," and is designed as a practical synopsis of that work, with the addition of copious examples and exercises, selected for the purpose of facilitating the application of theory to practice. We hope, however, that the use of this manual will induce students and teachers to consult, for themselves, that invaluable source of instruction, for an ample and complete statement of the theory of vocal culture, in connection with an exact analysis of the vocal functions. The manual now offered as an aid to the business of instruction, contains, besides a compendious view of the system of Dr. Rush, - the practical methods of instruction introduced by Mr. James E. Murdoch, and taught by Mr. Francis T. Russell, in that part of elocution which comprises phonation, or the formation of vocal tone, and orthophony, or the training of the vocal organs, on the rudiments of articulation, force, "stress," pitch, and the other elements of "expression," - including the whole organic discipline of "vocal gymnastics." The exercises imbodied in the following pages, are designed equally for the assistance of two classes of students, at very different stages of progress in general education, but requiring, alike, the benefit of a thorough-going course of practice in elocution; -young learners, whose habits of utterance are, as yet, forming; and adults, whose professional duties involve the exercise of public speaking. To the former, this manual will furnish the materials for a progressive cultivation and development of the vocal organs, for the useful purposes of education, and as a graceful accomplishment. To the latter, it affords the means of correcting erroneous habit in the use of the organs of speech, and of acquiring the command of an easy, healthful, and effective mode of managing the voice, in the act of reading or speaking in public. The plan adopted, in arranging the subsequent exercises, presents the various departments of elocution in the following order: 11. The function of BREATHING, as a preliminary to the use of the voice -2. The practice of ENUNCIATION, in the act of articulating elementary sounds and syllables, and of pronouncing words. —3. The study of the various "QUALITIES" of the voice, as an instrument of sound, and the training of the organs, with reference to the formation of "purity," fulness, vigor, and pliancy of voice.-4. The study and practice of FORCE, "STRESS," ," "MELODY," pitch, "slide," "wave," "monotone," and "semitone," "TIME," "quantity," "movement," "rhythm," metre, and pause, with a view to organic discipline and the command of the voice, in EMPHASIS and "EXPRESSION," the appropriate utterance of thought and emotion. To adapt the work to the purposes of practical instruction, and to render it convenient, as a class-book, those parts which are most important to learners, are distinguished by "leaded" lines, and larger type; and these are intended either to be impressed, in substance, on the memory, or to be practised as exercises. The portions of the work which are in smaller type, contain the theory and the explanations requisite for the guidance of the adult student and the teacher. The sentential or grammatical department of elocution, that which concerns the modifications of voice, for the purposes of strictly intellectual communication, the adapting of the voice to the structure of sentences in prose, and stanzas in poetry, — involves a more extensive study of "slides," (inflections,) emphasis, and pausing, together with prosodial elocution, or the regulation of the voice in the reading of verse. The full discussion and practice of these branches, are reserved for a separate course of study, as prescribed in the "American Elocutionist," to which the present manual is intended as an introduction. In that volume will also be found an extended course of practice in articulation and in pronunciation, with remarks on the character of cadence; and, in addition to the vocal part of elocution, an outline of the principles of gesture, and a collection of pieces for practice in reading and declamation. The stereotype process, adopted in this new edition of the present work, enables the publishers to offer it in a more compact shape, without diminishing the actual extent of the matter; while the new arrangement of the chapters, and the addition of the Tables of Orthophony, will, it is thought, render the volume more useful as a manual for schools and academies. 1 The arrangement adopted in this improved edition of the Orthophony, is intended to facilitate the business of instruction, by presenting more prominently those parts of elocution which are most important in practice. The chapter on the structure and action of the vocal organs, has been transferred, therefore, to the appendix. But adult students may derive advantage from perusing it, before commencing the practice of the various exercises. |